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Just a week ago, Lord of the Rings Online launched. Every wannabe game writer on the planet had their shot at a preview and a review and a perspective and an opinion. There seems to be a near-universal consensus on a few points.

-- It's World of Warcraft in Tolkien clothing.
-- It launched cleanly.
-- For a dedicated MMO player, LOTRO will just be an intermezzo -- something to tide them over until they either regain their passion for the One True Game, or move on to Warhammer or Age of Conan.

I believe all of this is true. I also think it misses the point.

My experience with MMOs has been similar to my experience in most games -- short term bursts of fashion, a modicum of skill, followed by a decline in interest, ending in a sense of guilt that I have moved on and somehow betrayed something which I loved, and loved me in return.

Lord of the Rings Online has only been part of my canon for a few months. I'm not naive enough to utter the four most expensive words in the English language (this time it's different) but I am willing to say that to dismiss LOTRO as just another MMO is a mistake.

What sets LOTRO apart on the surface is the story. Not the world, the story. Yes, LOTRO benefits from having a rich backdrop of shared experience. Everyone knows what a hobbit looks like, how elves talk, and where the Old Forest is. But this background is nothing more than a shortcut. World of Warcraft, EVE Online, Neocron -- they each have deep, well developed stories, and given the maturity of those worlds, the stories are for fans as convoluted, interesting, and compelling as Tolkien stories are to Tolkien fans. And while the shared knowledge creates accessibility, successful MMOs have long since learned how to bring new players into the stories, the world, and the characters in it in a believable and comfortable way.

The reason that Story sets LOTRO apart is because you know how it ends. This is a luxury World of Warcraft simply can never have. There is no logical end to WoW, where the evil WoW faction of the Horde is victorious, and every member of the good-aligned Alliance dies. The viciously PvP nature of EVE Online means that the story can only sit on the sidelines and inform, not take center stage. But in LOTRO, the game is the story. In this, the game has far more in common with Oblivion than it does with WoW.

When dedicated WoW players join LOTRO, they are hit with what's so similar. The skill system, the crafting system, targeting, combat, even much of the interface can be seen as derivative. Of course, that's the point. WoW built on what worked in the games before its rise to dominance, just as Ultima Online drew on what worked in the 3/4 view RPGs that predated it. This isn't unoriginal, it's common sense. Turbine has simply chosen to use conventions players already know. While there are unique tweaks here and there, and while those could form the basis of an endless discussion of pros and cons, they simply don't matter. These players will simply not survive long in the game. The lack of a real PvP system, and the "just different enough" aspect of the game will likely drive them back to WoW, or on to new games that offer genuine gameplay innovation.

What will keep LOTRO alive is the players who want to be part of a story. Yes, this will mean legions of scary Tolkein freaks who will sit in OOC chat and argue about what kind of tobacco should grow in the shire. But it also means that for those gamers able to admit their love for the story lines in games like Planescape: Torment and Oblivion, there's a new animal here. It's the Co-Op Destiny-locked RPG.

This new beast compels different motivations than WoW. In WoW, the ultimate goal is power. Capping your character is about accessing end game content, and end game content is about new shiny, more powerful PvP, and killing yet bigger bad guys. Don't get me wrong, I love pretty shiny things. And I love power-gathering and PvP and big bad guys. But LOTRO is simply designed to scratch a different itch.

When I log on to play for an evening, sure, I'm stoked if I level up. But I'm stoked not because becoming a bigger bad ass in its own right is fun. No, it's because I know that with more power, I will gain access to more plot. The story -- the real story -- of LOTRO starts at point A, and will, someday, lead to Point B with the destruction of the One Ring. Becoming more powerful means I can read one chapter further into that story, and play my small part in it. And by chapter I mean chapter -- the main story quests are divided into Chapters and Books, apparently following the loose timelines of the six books in the Lord of the Rings. (For the under-geeked, the Lord of the Rings is actually divided into 6 logical books, two packaged into each physical book.) If I'm grouped (umm... fellowed) with like minded souls, the denouement of a given chapter can be breathtaking not because we killed the baddie (woot!) but because we got to experience the story from a first person perspective.

In short, it makes me feel important to the life of the game. Just like Oblivion. Just like Planescape: Torment. And while in those games I know that generally speaking, "the good guys win," in the case of LOTRO, I know how the good guys win. The story I participate in sidecars along known events with known outcomes. Already Turbine has dropped the first carrot out there for new players. In June they're releasing the first content expansion, letting players tag along as Strider goes on a scavenger hunt for all the bits he needs to remake the "sword that was broken." We know what happens -- the sword gets remade. We know when it happens -- sometime between when Frodo shows up at Rivendell unconscious and the lazy buggers get their act together and start heading south. But we've never really known much about how it happened. We get to be part of that story. And while this could devolve into a plodding life of Calvinist pre-determination, so far, it hasn't. Turbine has managed to make the game feel fluid and open, while riding the story on rails.

And while all MMOs can be seen as co-op (after all, that's what grouping is all about), in the case of LOTRO the co-op is the whole point. While much of the content and all of the power of the game could be had solo, the story threads -- the chapters and books -- can't be pursued very far without help. I suppose theoretically a dedicated solo player could wait until they were level 40 to tackle the level 20 chapters solo, but along the way they would have missed most of the game. The game is designed so that everyone is on the same side, pursuing the same goals, together.

It's not a perfect game. As with any game, there are plenty of bugs, or just things that could be done better. It's not a "Killer" or "better than" any other MMO. But it is different in ways that won't show up on any tally sheet of features or rating system.

I agree with pretty much everything there, but having played it, came to a different conclusion. I think all those things will be the nails in LoTRO's coffin. It's every bit as wonderful as you've stated. It's truly an MMO built around the story that exists, and the players are there to further those events from the sideline. Therein, lies the problem. While I agree that there are a handful of players who will log into LoTRO, and enjoy being a minor character, I think there's too many people who want to be something more than that. They want to be the trusted hero sent in Thrall's stead to slay the dragon. It's sad, but that's something I think Turbine will be coming to grips with after the 'newness' of LoTRO has worn off.

Or maybe I'm just jaded and cynical and bristle a little at seeing one of my favorite fantasy novel turned into a MMO

It's not a perfect game. As with any game, there are plenty of bugs, or just things that could be done better. It's not a "Killer" or "better than" any other MMO. But it is different in ways that won't show up on any tally sheet of features or rating system.

Excellent article Rabbit, it sums up my feelings exactly.

For me it came home a long time ago when I was giving someone directions in OOC... and I had a distinct giddy fanboi feeling come over me when I realized I was telling someone directions in Middle Earth... not just some other made for a game setting but good old Arda. That's not just some randomly named river it's the Brandywine, that's not just some ruins on a hill - it's Amon Sul, there's the rock with the message left by Gandalf, this is Imladris not just random elf town... My imagination and knowledge of the lore probably makes me overlook other failings but so far it's been pure fun. Yeah, I'm a Tolkien nerd and I love it.

"When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up" - C.S. Lewis

1) It's tremendously like WoW, but they copied the forms without understanding why they were done that way. They tried to put a new coat of paint on an old idea, but they didn't entirely understand the old ideas.

Combat, at least through level 14, is both painfully slow (your character takes FOREVER to do freaking ANYTHING) and painfully fast if you have multiple people; all the bad guys go down like paper dolls. The Guardian taunt ability takes 2 or 3 seconds to fire from the time you hit 'go'... in fact, I can't think of ANY truly instant powers. This is very frustrating, because you can't both watch the critters to see what they're doing AND monitor your own combat status, which is reflected in these TINY TINY TINY little buttons down at the bottom of the screen. They're too far away for peripheral vision, and there's just not time to track five critters AND monitor cooldowns when the cooldown information is presented so poorly. In WoW, the buttons are big and obvious; in LOTRO, they're small, ugly, and simply don't convey information well.

The lag in firing abilities is the single most frustrating thing about the game so far. It is maddening at times.

Second: yes, the story is good. Yes, I would very much enjoy playing a minor character in the LOTRO world. I don't need to be Frodo and Sam, I'd be perfectly happy being Grungo the Spear Carrier. But the story exposition so far is extremely poorly presented. There's not time to really understand and appreciate what's happening. 'Boss' fights start with little fanfare and are over equally quickly. There's no sense of story because things are so rushed... it's "There's a dreadful threat in the woods!" and then whamwhamwhamwhamwhamwham and then "You've eliminated the dreadful threat in the woods, and now Frodo and Sam are safer!"

There's no story here so far, just random flailing with bits of exposition.

One thing Blizzard really, really gets is presentation and framing. Their graphic artists are incredibly good, and their sense of drama is better than that of any other company in gaming, period. Their source material sucks rocks; the WoW universe is incredibly boring. But they present it so very, very well that each instance, particularly when it's a raid, is a very unique experience. An example: in the BC expansion, there's a fairly long, tough instance with a giant glowy critter at the end. (I understand he looks a lot like a raid boss, but I never did much raiding.) He's literally framed by the crumbling archway of the room that leads to him. He starts small, but as you fight your way across the large room, you realize that he is very large indeed. The sense of looming peril is just awesome, and when you finally do take him on, the last 20 minutes of buildup makes it an even better fight.

Another good example of that kind of framing and presentation is the big dog-critter in Dire Maul. Very cool stuff.

Now, LOTRO is low-magic. They can't easily have big glowy barriers that you slowly take down while the critter slavers at you, desperate to eat your face. But they could certainly do a much better job with pacing and framing, using great voice actors. The most recent thing I went through:

Minor L14 Spoiler wrote:

[color=white]A man is kidnapped, and you're trying to rescue him (I believe, I was rushed through the early part by my group so I didn't get to read all the text), and the Ringwraiths are turning him into one of them. By LOTRO standards, that is a big frakking deal. That's one of the most powerful bits of magic that the PCs will probably ever see. And all he does is stand up, announces he's now SomeBadDude Serving Sauron(TM), flails ineffectually at you for 10 seconds, and then crumples.[/color]

That is abysmal storytelling. That should have been frightening and horrible. It should have been deep, guttural chanting, perhaps with some howling as the magic took effect while while you worked your way around the barred gates to get to the ritual. It should have had power and it offered nothing.

I'll tell ya, after seeing that tonight, I'm really not too up on this supposed LOTRO storyline thing. I don't think these guys have any freaking idea how to tell a story; the only reason it's even vaguely good is because the source material is so rich.

The little side stories are good, at least in the Shire. But the main storyline, so far, has been poorly done. It it not worthy of Tolkien.

I played as a lore-master to start with, big mistake. A level 8 lore-master is easily defeated by two level 7 monsters. Now that wouldn't be a problem except in all the newbie areas there is a very high respawn rate and they are all grouped together. Also a gripe of mine, the mobs "eye" range is all over the place, it's hard to know who you will trigger and who you won't. So here I was, an expert with pets in many MMORPGs, getting beat constantly by lower level mobs because I would get ganged up on.

I switched to a champion, at level 8 I can successfully take on three level 8 monsters. That's the worst class balance I've seen since Everquest.

I have a lot of things to say on this game but I think I can sum it up pretty well and it shows my agreements.

LOTRO is worse then other MMORPGs in every way except one. LOTRO has the best quests. They're more interactive, more interesting, more compelling. I am suffering through all the flaws of LOTRO because the quests are that damn good.

Count me as another totally on board the LOTRO train. I'm not even a MMO kinda guy (I did play WoW for a few months, but the game felt pretty flat for for me) and I have fallen in love with this game. I am a huge Tolkien nut and I think they have really captured the flavor of the books. The farther you get into the storyline the better it gets. The Book 1: Chapter 11 (Great Barrow) instance was truly dread inspiring.

You really need to group to get the most out of the game and the quests. The interdependence of the class types seem pretty developed to my neophyte senses. Sure you can try and solo some, but fellowship grouping is where the real fun is. Besides you only get use the completely awesome fellowship skills when grouped.

If you are new to the game and want to get the most out of it, start as a Hobbit. I've tried the man and elf starting areas and they don't feel as rich to me. The Shire is the most developed of the starting areas and you won't run out of great and varied quests to do.

1) It's tremendously like WoW, but they copied the forms without understanding why they were done that way. They tried to put a new coat of paint on an old idea, but they didn't entirely understand the old ideas.

Combat, at least through level 14, is both painfully slow (your character takes FOREVER to do freaking ANYTHING) and painfully fast if you have multiple people; all the bad guys go down like paper dolls. The Guardian taunt ability takes 2 or 3 seconds to fire from the time you hit 'go'... in fact, I can't think of ANY truly instant powers. This is very frustrating, because you can't both watch the critters to see what they're doing AND monitor your own combat status, which is reflected in these TINY TINY TINY little buttons down at the bottom of the screen. They're too far away for peripheral vision, and there's just not time to track five critters AND monitor cooldowns when the cooldown information is presented so poorly. In WoW, the buttons are big and obvious; in LOTRO, they're small, ugly, and simply don't convey information well.

The lag in firing abilities is the single most frustrating thing about the game so far. It is maddening at times.

I am greatly amused by the fact that you've come to the same conclusion as I did after 30 minutes with the game, repeating what I said almost verbatim - they aped WoW without knowing what they're doing. In fact, you said "forms", which draws comparison to LOTRO designers blindly repeating WoW kata without learning the lessons that lie within. They had neither the humility necessary to copy WoW closely enough, nor the experience to go off and extend it into something worthy on their own. The resulting product is a sum of ego and inexperience.

That, and your observations about LOTRO combat being broken are in line with my initial observations

WoW: spell charges (bar fills up), you fire off a spell, spell charges, you fire off a spell, etc etc

LOTRO: spell charges, you fire off a spell, COOLDOWN, spell charges, you fire off a spell, COOLDOWN

The fact that this additional cooldown isn't simply added to the timing of the initial CHARGING process is typical of the amateur gameplay design that permeates the game. Simply put, someone with half a brain wouldn't let this happen in the game. It just is not possible.

But the story exposition so far is extremely poorly presented. There's not time to really understand and appreciate what's happening. 'Boss' fights start with little fanfare and are over equally quickly. There's no sense of story because things are so rushed... it's "There's a dreadful threat in the woods!" and then whamwhamwhamwhamwhamwham and then "You've eliminated the dreadful threat in the woods, and now Frodo and Sam are safer!"

After observing the tacky ring-shaped icons above NPC's heads, and the fact that the first NPC you meet is called something like "Mondo-Raoul Baggins", I extrapolated that the storyline was going to be of this exact quality.

The rose-colored glasses of hype and expectations have been ground into tiny pieces by the tremendous weight of this game's mediocrity. Sad too, because I pre-ordered it and have the damn box. A part of me still hopes they fire half the original team and get someone to fix it within a year.

I can't say I disagree terribly with most folks negative comments about the game. And I do think that there will be many put off by various aspects of the game. I have no sense yet of how long the games legs will be fore me -- I haven't capped a character of finished the story. But for all the criticisms, I can honestly say I just enjoy it more than I've ever enjoyed WoW, and I put some serious time in on WoW. WoW just stopped being fun for me in the midgame. The story seemed, well, non-existent, the quests random, and the instances tedious.

I'm sure folks will say the same thing about LOTRO, and I don't think it's going to attract huge hords of players from WoW (or anywhere else). But it's got me thinking about what an MMO can do a little bit differently.

Can someone describe what the group content in LOTRO is like? I played in the beta but really only did solo stuff. Are there group instances? Do they have a sense of grandeur and accomplishment?

I think one thing that LOTRO has in its favor is that there are TONS of locations and people in the books that were little more than points on a map or footnotes. If they do it right it means they can really flesh out the world for the hardcore fans without ever stepping on the toes of the main storyline.

WoW: spell charges (bar fills up), you fire off a spell, spell charges, you fire off a spell, etc etc

LOTRO: spell charges, you fire off a spell, COOLDOWN, spell charges, you fire off a spell, COOLDOWN

The fact that this additional cooldown isn't simply added to the timing of the initial CHARGING process is typical of the amateur gameplay design that permeates the game. Simply put, someone with half a brain wouldn't let this happen in the game. It just is not possible.

To be fair, WoW has plenty of cooldowns too, they're just used more sparingly for abilities that are really special. But yeah, combat in LOTRO has a definitely pacing issue that they need to look at.

In general I agree with the WoW comparisons, although I think they traits and accomplishments system is pretty fresh and potentially more interesting than the WoW talent system. Don't get me wrong, the talent system is brilliant, but I don't really feel like you can argue that the trait system was just ripped off from WoW.

"You know, hubbinsd, as much as I don't want to go into library science, I still think you're pretty sexy." -Wordsmythe

[color=white]A man is kidnapped, and you're trying to rescue him (I believe, I was rushed through the early part by my group so I didn't get to read all the text), and the Ringwraiths are turning him into one of them. By LOTRO standards, that is a big frakking deal. That's one of the most powerful bits of magic that the PCs will probably ever see. And all he does is stand up, announces he's now SomeBadDude Serving Sauron(TM), flails ineffectually at you for 10 seconds, and then crumples.[/color]

Just so I understand, your party rushed you through the text (ie: STORY) and so without the context, you didn't think they did a good enough job telling you a story? Showing you a story? I get the complaints in general, I agree with most of them, but in any story you only get what you put into it. I LOVED the quest line this spoiler is a part of, I thought it had a great progression through the low levels until you finished it off.

I could see it all looking pretty weak if a player doesn't settle down and read what's given to him/her. I expect quite a few people won't appreciate the story and find the rest lacking in comparison to what has come before.

“We are all capable of becoming fundamentalists because we get addicted to other people’s wrongness.”
~Pema Chödrön

WoW just stopped being fun for me in the midgame. The story seemed, well, non-existent, the quests random, and the instances tedious.

You are SO right. The fun that I had with the instances is almost entirely due to playing through them with a great group of Goodjers. (That said, I'm currently taking advantage of the 10 free days offer to both former and new players)

Nice article and some great points. I'm playing LOTRO and enjoying the hell out of it. I don't see why it gets so much hate. It's not perfect, there's some elements that could certainly be better, but I think there's a lot that they did really well. With all the graphics turned up to ultra the game is simply beautiful. I understand not everyone can run it at ultra level, which is unfortunate. The quests and world are compelling, and I really like the idea of the main quest that follows the books.

There's no disputing WoW is considered the greated MMORPG out there. I played it extensively, but I've moved on. If you're still playing WoW I doubt you're going to like LOTRO and switch, but if you like the tolkien universe and are looking for a more quest driven experience then LOTRO might be a game for you.

There is no logical end to WoW, where the evil WoW faction of the Horde is victorious, and every member of the good-aligned Alliance dies.

This may get you some dirty looks because in WoW, neither side is truly evil and both sides have evil races (for the horde the blood elves and undead are somewhat evil and for the alliance humans can be somewhat evil).

But back to LotRO, here is what turned me off from the game: the information about the first big content release. It was something like "Aragorn is in Rivendell about to reforge his sword, but he needs a gem that was lost in some northern town. YOU need to go and get this gem for him so he can continue on his quest." What. The. Hell.

EDIT: Also note, this article just got linked on Slashdot. So be prepared. ^_^

Just so I understand, your party rushed you through the text (ie: STORY) and so without the context, you didn't think they did a good enough job telling you a story? Showing you a story? I get the complaints in general, I agree with most of them, but in any story you only get what you put into it. I LOVED the quest line this spoiler is a part of, I thought it had a great progression through the low levels until you finished it off.

I love a good written story as much as the next guy; more maybe, as I'm a voracious reader. But this is NOT a text medium. There is just no excuse for letting a paragraph tell a story, particularly one of central importance to the storyline, when it could be done with exposition.

The fundamental rule of storytelling: show, don't tell. They have an enormous tool for showing, but they barely use it. I understand using text as the storyline for all the ancillary quests -- there are hundreds of them, after all -- but the central quest line should have been a huge focus and barely dependent on text at all. Text as supplement? Sure.... but text as main meat of the main storyline, with nothing cinematic or interesting in the actual encounters? This is terribly sloppy.

That spoiler section I quoted up there should have been something to remember for years; that should have been at least as cool as Dire Maul. Instead, the quests leading up to that huge story point? Start at point A. Run to point B, slaughtering everything in your path. Instance over. Yay.

The instance containing the main story point? Start at point A. Run to point B, with a couple of interruptions by NPCs. Slaughter everything in your path. Yay.

We should be talking in hushed tones about how overwhelmingly cool that adventure was and how frightened we were. It should have had power, and it offered nothing.

Edit to add: I forgot to answer this:

I am greatly amused by the fact that you've come to the same conclusion as I did after 30 minutes with the game, repeating what I said almost verbatim - they aped WoW without knowing what they're doing.

I think I read your original post, and that might be where I got the idea, but I agree very strongly with this observation. It's like the Soviets copying American technology without really understanding it. ("ok, we need buttons for powers. We need five bags. We need a global cooldown."... etc etc.)

There's some really neat stuff to the game, but I'm just tremendously disappointed with the lack of work in the main storyline so far, and I don't think they really understand their own game design.

Even though I doubt I'll give LOTRO any more than the 10 minutes I've given it so far, I do like what I'm hearing about the quests being much better than WoW. For every remotely decent quest, WoW has 20 that are dog poo. Very few have any personality.

ending in a sense of guilt that I have moved on and somehow betrayed something which I loved, and loved me in return.

MMOs never did love you back. They do black things in the forgotten recesses of your soul.

But it also means that for those gamers able to admit their love for the story lines in games like Planescape: Torment and Oblivion, there's a new animal here. It's the Co-Op Destiny-locked RPG.

This new beast compels different motivations than WoW. In WoW, the ultimate goal is power. Capping your character is about accessing end game content, and end game content is about new shiny, more powerful PvP, and killing yet bigger bad guys. Don't get me wrong, I love pretty shiny things. And I love power-gathering and PvP and big bad guys. But LOTRO is simply designed to scratch a different itch.

I know what you're trying to do here. You're trying to pry open my heart with your crowbar words. It won't happen, though. I read the comments, and have renewed my resolve to avoid MMOs! Thank you, noble naysayers!

(And btw, great job at the lead before the jump, Rabbit!)

Hypatian wrote:

Words... are a big deal.

Enix wrote:

The only way writers are going to get better is if they get some decent damned editing.

Nice article Rabbit. I really enjoy the game and it is hard to get more vetran of a mmo player then me. I am not a Tolkien fanboi either. Sure I read the books including Similirian over 20 years ago but other that is about it.

Combat pacing and the story all seem great to me but maybe I have no taste and a pea sized brain which makes pleasing me easy.

What I do know is that I am certainly enjoying this game more then I enjoyed any other MMORPG since UO/EQ days because of the story and the fact I do not have to kill 500 cultist or what have you to get rep or to buy a bag or the other mindless grinds for gear/levels/access yada yada that MMO have become.

I really tried to love LotRO. It's probably the mmo so far that I've most wanted to love, and kept trying to find things to like about it, but it just didn't do it.

The "story" that makes the game so awesome and epic? Nah, didn't do it for me. Malor makes solid points that I agree with on it. Sure, the flavor of the writing in the game fits the world of Middle-Earth well, and even the voice acting sounds decent enough. But the story sequences I played through in beta were just horribly disappointing overall. It's like they just took generic stuff and threw in a ringwraith or main story character here or there just to say "hey, look, it's Lord of the Rings! Lord of the Rings! Be excited, isn't this awesome?!"

I'll even ignore the run-of-the-mill questing that was the majority of the time I spent in the game; that stuff is filler to help us get from point A to point B (be it geographically or in terms of character development).

I'm not even going to compare the game to WoW here. If I were, I'd say that yeah, the storyline stuff in LotRO is better than WoW, though I never saw anything in LotRO that was as great as some of the early key instance encounters in WoW.

I'm still just purely talking as someone who has read both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings multiple times, loves the films, and has read the Silmarillion only once (but my second reading will be soon!). Yes, it's nifty that there are landmarks in the game that are from the books. Currently, this is the biggest draw to me.

But stuff like what Malor described in the spoiler segment? That stuff just honestly doesn't make sense.

Spoiler wrote:

[color=white]
Maybe I missed the part in LotR or the Silmarillion where the ringwraiths were like vampires and could convert people into ringwraiths. As I recall, there were exactly nine of them. Why? Because they were the kings who received rings from Sauron, who used the One Ring to corrupt them. That stuff just completely ruins any other impact that the "epic story" might have.[/color]

Seriously, I wanted to love this game. I thought it would be good. And while I can see why others enjoy it, it really just isn't all that everyone's making it out to be, imo. Which is a pity, because with the cancellation of the White Council (the Elder Scrolls-style LotR game that was in the works), this was my only hope for a decent game with a lot of lore and exploration in Middle-Earth.

"We are at our best when we work together. We are at our worst when we expend valuable and finite energy and resources destroying one another." - Paleocon, regarding humanity.

I enjoy the game because it's enough like WoW that I like the gameplay and I like the world better than WoW's world, which I cannot remember the name of.
I'm happy just to see the sights and play the game.

Can someone describe what the group content in LOTRO is like? I played in the beta but really only did solo stuff. Are there group instances? Do they have a sense of grandeur and accomplishment?

The first real group content does not come until players have progressed somewhat into the main epic quest, not counting a few group quest found in the prologues and newibie areas.

One of Malor's complaints regarding the toughness/easiness of most mobs that he encountered is that he was primarily dealing with normal mobs, which only present a challange to the solo player when they are found in large numbers, and never present that much of a challenge to groups.

Players will typically not encounter elite level mobs until their late teens or even into their twenties, but when they do the problem of the mob dying in a hit or two are not an issue.

Group instances are in the game, and while I have purposely avoided most of them during beta, the ones I have experienced have been wonderfully flavorful and very challenging to full fellowships.

For those who are complaining about the story being advanced via text, not that the retail release also advances the story via in game cut scenes and wonderful narration, and that in my opinion, Book 1 is much more engrossing than any of the racial prologues.

Still, if your burned out on WoW and *need* something completely new, as others have already said this is probably not the game for you.

Posting on the boards is easy. The trick is to kick someone's ass the first day, or become someone's bitch. Chiggie Von Richthofen on how to transition from lurker to poster.

[color=white]
Unless I'm wrong, when Frodo got pricked by the blade in book 1, doesn't Strider go on about how people wounded by things like that turn into servants of the RW? I'm no deep geek on this stuff honestly.[/color]

Maybe that's one reason the game just didn't keep my interest - I don't play these games for the story. If I wanted the story, the narrative of LOTR, I would just go read the books again. And those books are special to me - and the game just didn't feel like them. Nor would I expect it to I guess, the magic of those books was my personal interaction with the pages, no game could duplicate that.

So to me, it was just a smaller, scaled down WoW that didn't really deliver what I wanted.

[color=white]
Unless I'm wrong, when Frodo got pricked by the blade in book 1, doesn't Strider go on about how people wounded by things like that turn into servants of the RW? I'm no deep geek on this stuff honestly.[/color]

Spoiler response

[color=white]While that's true, I don't recall ever reading about the process ending up that way for anyone else in Middle-Earth, so I suspect that it would've killed him and turned him into a wight perhaps, but not a ringwraith.

I just really didn't feel that that part of the story really worked for me. Maybe my Tolkien geekiness (which is mild compared to others I know) makes it tougher for me to enjoy stuff that feels like it violates Middle-Earth canon too much.[/color]

"We are at our best when we work together. We are at our worst when we expend valuable and finite energy and resources destroying one another." - Paleocon, regarding humanity.

I guess the short of it is that the Lord of the Rings license on this product actually harms it for me. The game is fine, it's the (again, for me) misuse of my favorite fantasy setting, the books I hold dear, that really keeps me from being able to enjoy the game. If this was Asheron's Call 3, with that fantasty universe's content instead of LotR, or an entirely new property, I'd probably be able to enjoy it more.

Which is why I say that I can see why so many people are really loving the game. I'm not saying the game is a bad product, just that for me, it isn't really Lord of the Rings enough, and thus is more frustrating than enjoyable. I hope that changes with time, and I expect in a year or two I'll give it another shot, but right now it just doesn't feel right despite the great mechanics and nicely done mmo-standard gameplay.

"We are at our best when we work together. We are at our worst when we expend valuable and finite energy and resources destroying one another." - Paleocon, regarding humanity.